


steady the pound

by disastermovie



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: (more accurately: sharing a blanket on the ground), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s01e07 Horrible from Supper, F/M, Sharing a Bed, Vignette, frostyfuntime2k19
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:26:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21842143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disastermovie/pseuds/disastermovie
Summary: Silna doesn’t want to be alone. Not right now.
Relationships: Harry D. S. Goodsir/Lady Silence | Silna
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49
Collections: janky franky's frosty fun time 2k19





	steady the pound

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day two of Janky Franky's Frosty Funtime 2019! Today's prompt was **two to a sack**. I'm really fond of this one.
> 
> Title from ["Sound" by Daniela Andrade](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqf2DJgucsU).

There’s red all over the snow, bits of flesh and bone scattered around. The shouting and confusion that filled the camp moments ago has turned to complete silence, everyone left staring at what’s left the pale man, his head shattered open on the ground. 

_Why did I give Tuunbaq my tongue_ , she thinks, her whole mouth a familiar ache, _if they’re all just going to kill each other?_

Goodsir falls to his knees beside the body, and Silna finds that she’s taken two steps forward before she could stop herself. She rushes back between the tents as the men start moving, forming a tighter circle around the scene, hiding Goodsir and the carnage from view. She can still hear it all so clearly in her head: screaming, men begging, the loud boom from the thing. A gun, Goodsir had said, back on the ship when she could still say the word back to him.

She wearily eyes the man who’d just used his. The dead man had been waving his own gun about, too, and the bright burst it made had been just as terrifying. She still doesn’t trust this one. She doesn’t trust any of them.

For a second, she thinks the man has seen her. Even when she realizes he’s looking somewhere past her, her hands sweat, and her legs begging her to run. She stands still.

Somebody speaks - Aglooka, she realizes - and the crowd begins to disperse. Silna moves further into the shadows, watching them go by, not keen on any of them noticing her. Her presence is tolerated at best since she came to them by choice (for _once_ ), covered in her own blood as she stumbled her way toward the bright lights. She doesn’t remember much beyond that. There was pain, _so much pain_ , the ugly taste of blood in her mouth, and Goodsir’s concerned face above her.

She looks for that face now, but it’s too dark to make their faces out and she’s never been good at telling them apart besides, even from a short distance. A few of the men lift the body. Silna looks away, eyes shut tight as her breath stutters. Even behind her eyelids, all she can see is the gore.

In the end, Silna waits until there’s only a few men scattered around outside. A few of them are standing at the edges, guns in hand. She’s careful as she makes her away across camp and reaches Goodsir’s tent without being noticed. She could go back to her own tent, away from everybody else, but Goodsir’s is closer and she’d rather be _here_. She’s about to enter, hand half-raised toward the opening, when she hears it.

A soft whimpering comes from inside.

Silna is the only one with her own tent, though everyone else seems to share. Silna would question Goodsir about it, or Aglooka, if she could. She assumes that it’s because she’s an unwanted addition to the pale men’s small numbers, so they sleep together in warmth while she shivers alone. Goodsir shares his his tent with a man who doesn’t say a word; whenever Silna sees him, he’s always huddled in some corner, staring silently ahead. Sometimes, she finds the man trembling, while Goodsir talks to him in hushed tones.

She doesn’t know if its the other man or Goodsir inside the tent. She doesn’t want to see the other one, if he’s the one crying. She wants to see Goodsir, hear his voice tell her about England and show her his sketches of various animals that she’s never seen before and never will. She’d rather have that than remember what’s just happened (the bright burst from the gun, the booming sound, then Goodsir staring at the body and falling to the ground, on his knees like a tired child-).

She wants to not remember. She wants to _not think_.

Silna lifts open the tent flaps and slips inside.

A lamp glows softly in the center. Goodsir is alone; he startles when she enters, looking at her over his shoulder. Silna takes him in - he’s trembling, wide-eyed, gasping and whimpering beneath his blanket. She wonders, distantly, if he wants to be alone. Silna doesn’t want to be alone. Not right now.

Goodsir doesn’t tell Silna to leave. He doesn’t tell her anything, not even when she walks over and lays down beside him, pressed up to his back. He just keeps crying as he turns away from her. Silna’s eyes burn.

Slowly - like Goodsir is some skittish thing - she reaches up to rest a hand on his arm. She doesn’t do anything else. She just lays there, a hand on his arm, their legs pressed together while Silna shuts her eyes against her own tears. As if she’ll be able to sleep, when she sees everything so clearly in her head. The dead man. _All_ of the dead men. Her father, her mother. Tuunbaq.

She swallows around the lump in her throat. _Breathe_ , she thinks, squeezing his arm, _just breathe. In through your nose, out through your mouth. Please, breathe._ She concentrates on the thought, as if Goodsir could hear her, as if the hand on his arm is enough. It’s all she can do, to let him know that she’s here.

She tightens her grip. _I’m here_.

Goodsir calms. His breathing slows, his little sobs fade off into shaky gasps, and Silna is grateful as the trembling stops. Now, all that she can feel behind their layers of clothing is the gentle rise and fall of his body. Silna keeps her eyes closed as she does the same, as she tries to embrace the blackness behind her eyes and not remember anything she’s seen. She feels her tongue pressing behind her teeth, even though it’s cut too short to reach that far. The half that’s left still aches when she swallows.

After some time, Goodsir shifts. His hand is cold when it covers Silna’s. His grip tightens with her shaking breaths, while she presses up closer against his back and rests her nose against the nape of his neck.

Eventually, the hot tears stop threatening to spill over Silna’s cheeks. The lump in her throat clears so that she can breathe unfettered. The memory of her tongue on the roof of her mouth remains, but she can breathe, now, in time with Goodsir.

She curls her fingers over his, returning his grip. _I’m glad that you’re here._ His hand is warm, now, pressed against hers. Goodsir is warm.

Silna hangs onto him, and breathes.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr at [diydumpsterdiving](https://diydumpsterdiving.tumblr.com/).


End file.
